Some people get fired and spiral. Others get fired and laugh all the way home. This story falls squarely into the second category.
When this couple had their first child, they did the math that every new parent eventually faces: daycare vs. staying home. After factoring in commuting costs, work clothes, gas, lunches out, and everything else that quietly drains a paycheck, the husband’s job would have brought in a net of… $5,000 a year. Not nothing, but not exactly worth missing your kid’s first steps for.
So they decided he’d resign and stay home. He cleaned out his desk, wrote a polite, professional letter, and walked into his already-scheduled meeting with his boss the next day ready to hand it over.
Except he didn’t get the chance. Before he could utter a word, his boss told him they were no longer in need of his services.
What followed was a comedy of timing, including six weeks of severance, months of paid health insurance, and, because he’d been fired instead of resigning, eighteen months of unemployment benefits. He stayed home for almost five years.
When he finally did return to work, it was for someone who later retired and sold him the business. Today, he earns triple what he made at the job that fired him.
A firing has never aged better.
